Category Archives: Books & Book Reviews

Do not rocket while impaired…

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Space TrippingSpace Tripping by Patrick Edwards
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Three stars-ish.

IF you’re looking for distant planets, space battles, far ranging corporate plots and drunk aliens doing the equivalent of “hold my beer” then this book is for you. It was amusing and a very quick read. I think I actually knocked it out in a day.

The reason this suffers in my opinion is that I have other drunken adventures that I am much more partial to. Totally not a “fair” thing to this author, but it is how I feel.

If you like this book and you’re looking for something else, you will probably very much enjoy the works of the Drunken Comic Book Monkeys in Scary Tales of Scariness (Fortress Publishing).

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Magic Kingdom

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Magic Kingdom for Sale—Sold!Magic Kingdom for Sale—Sold! by Terry Brooks
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I think I read this once a long time ago. I suspect it didn’t fit with the sort of fantasy I was expecting at the time so I didn’t particularly remember it, but I picked it up again since it was a book group choice.

This actually falls directly into the category of “matters when you read it”. The main character is NOT the typical fantasy hero. He’s already had a lot of life and success in his career. He’s middle aged, not the mystery secret sixteen year old prince who’s been in hiding all his life. At this time in my life I really appreciated the difference in character.

Yes, there are other fantasy tropes in there that were kind of expected. Yes, there are some small hints of anachronism since the book was written over 30 years ago. None of those things bothered me and I really enjoyed the story this time. This may very well move up to the top of the Terry Brooks list for me.

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Justice

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Ancillary Justice (Imperial Radch, #1)Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is one of the best science fiction works I’ve read in a very long time. I really enjoyed this book. I understand why it garnered the praise that it did.

Taking the point of view character away from being a human is never easy, but splitting that character apart into the many places an AI can inhabit would be particularly challenging and the author handles it wonderfully.

There is a lot of discussion worthy stuff in here. IF you’re a fan of science fiction this is very much worth the read.

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Fiction fan

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I’ve written reviews of Linda Nagata’s work before over at MilSciFi.com. The Red series is not the only work by her that I’ve read. She is one of the writers whose work I look at and think, “Damn it, she’s good. It’s almost not fair…”

And then I want to go out and see what she’s done next.

This post allows her to tell you a little about her latest – and I’m really looking forward to checking out her “big idea”:

The Last Good Man

Barbarian

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Conan the Barbarian: The Complete CollectionConan the Barbarian: The Complete Collection by Robert E. Howard
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Conan. It took a barbarian’s strength to push through this whole thing. It was a test of endurance for me. Not because I didn’t like the stories, just because there was so much of the same thing stacked up in one place!

This collection was assembled (as I understand it) from multiple novels that were not originally part of the same work. What happens when they are lumped together is that you get a repetition of phrasing you might not otherwise notice. Comparisons to wolves and tigers using the same descriptors gets really old – quickly.

I see clearly where the inspiration for Frazetta and so many others comes from. This is a cornerstone in the building that is modern fantasy. There are many, many things that clearly descend from this ancestor.

At the same time, it does have issues. IF you decide to take the challenge and plow through this whole thing, be prepared for turns of phrases that are out of date. Prepare for the use of language that has developed different connotations over the intervening eighty years or so – giving an odd flavor to the text despite the technically correct usage of certain words. Also be prepared for characters that are placed / labeled or otherwise called out based on their physical descriptions. Any non-white persons in this book are judged and categorized based on that fact. I don’t know if that was the opinion of the author or a shorthand sort of cheat. Why develop a villain when all I need to say is “he was of the darkest jungle with fuzzy hair and sharpened teeth”? It’s uncomfortable and makes certain aspects of the book less enjoyable for it. Females fall directly into either weak and lust worthy or strong and lust worthy – either category to be part of the conquest. There really are women of power in here, just don’t expect them to take on significant roles.

I would say it’s important to read this original Conan material to learn where so much of today’s fantasy comes from, but read it with the age and context in mind.

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Reviews

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From time to time I get to post reviews of military science fiction over at MilSciFi and I’m really happy about that. I like being able to share what I thought about various works in a field I enjoy.

When I’m not writing “official” reviews over there, I post up reviews of what I’m reading over at Goodreads. I cross post a lot of my reviews from there to my blog here, but I think it’s worth being on a list like that to see the recommendations (or warnings) from friends about what’s good to read out there. I’ve posted about all this before…

The part I don’t think I’ve written about before is the fact that when I signed up I made a choice. I decided not to go backward. I hadn’t thought about that choice until a book popped up in a friends feed the other day that I remember reading years ago.

I remember this being a good book!

I used to read a ton of epic fantasy. Everything I could lay a hand on. I’ve got hundreds of books here at the house… but I haven’t gone back to list any of what I have on Goodreads. None of them, unless I read them again. There are a couple of aspects to this. First, my memories of how good something was vs. how good I would think something is now matter to me. Second, if I just listed a couple hundred books up on the site would anyone consider my “stars” relevant?

It seems like a daunting task to go back through all the shelves and list all those works. What do you think? Should I figure a good way to list all the books I have up on Goodreads or let it go? What have you done?

Man And Machine!

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Man and MachineMan and Machine by Mike McPhail
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Right up front – one of my stories is in here. I *might* be biased in my rating.

I really did enjoy the stories in this book. There are some really good stories and very talented writers in there and I’m very happy to have the chance to share the pages with them.

I won’t give any spoilers, but there is a punch to the feelings at the end.

Go, get a copy!

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Pale dreaming

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The Bone Season (The Bone Season, #1)The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

First – I find it annoying that this posted to the “read” shelf despite the fact that I didn’t do that. The electronic connection isn’t making me happy.

Also – the version of the book I bought had an “extra” of the prequel “The Pale Dreamer”… at the END of the book. It would have made sense to put that at the START since that’s where it is in the time line of the story. Instead, I got the history of why the folks in her gang like each other AFTER they went through the adventure of the whole previous book. That really put me off.

So, on to the book itself. I liked the style of writing. I liked the main character for the most part. She grew, learned and took on the mantle of hero when she needed to. I have issues with the romance in the story, but that’s my issue – not the story itself. I don’t like the “I hate you, but somehow that means I love you” connection with people. I file it directly next to “boys are smelly throw things at them if you like them” emotional level. Doesn’t work for me.

The world building was a little… odd? There was an awful lot going on. That wouldn’t be such a big deal except at certain points it overwhelmed the stuff I was trying to get out of the story. It was futuristic, but also had alternate history of our current time line. There were bits of UK terminology that were in there that distracted from time to time. There are a handful of little things that I found distracting.

I gave the book 3 stars, but I really think of it as a weak 3 stars. I finished the book, but I don’t see me going and looking for more.

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Lost Something…

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Lost EverythingLost Everything by Brian Francis Slattery
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I picked this book up for a couple of reasons – and none of them appear to have been the right reasons.

The setting of this book is the area where I currently live. Descriptions of places are easy for me to picture. Things like the Market Street Bridge can be seen from my office on a daily basis. That was not nearly enough to make me enjoy the book more.

My first issue was the writing style itself. It was an odd sort of future reminiscence – almost as if somebody on the other side of this unholy disaster was looking back fondly at a time during the disaster itself. The author often skipped from current time line to flash back in the middle of a chapter because the narrator was describing things nobody in the scene could possibly have known. It was distracting and constantly kept me out of the flow of the book.

The flow… seemed to just wind along with the river and not actually go anywhere despite journeying all the way up the Susquehanna to New York. I struggled to care about any of the characters and related to none of them.

On the plus side, I did actually finish the book. The story does seem to conclude, but I couldn’t bring myself to get excited about it. I’d have trouble recommending this one.

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Jammed

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JamJam by Yahtzee Croshaw
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book was more than a bit ridiculous – and that works in its favor. It only suffered in my opinion because I had just finished two other very amusing books right before I read this one.

The point of view character is… well he’s not particularly bright. He is though, the nicest character in the book. He is also dedicated to his friends and that made him easy to relate to. I struggled with the time line of this story. It seemed far too short for the amount of crazy involved – and there was a lot of crazy. Only a handful of things ‘didn’t translate’ from Australian to American (as opposed to the many things from Oddjobs). The setting was important to the book – but only that it involved a city with an office tower, a mall and access to the ocean.

This was amusing and if you’re looking for something light and fun it’s worth checking out.

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